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Two crowds made up of dozens of men each clash on the dirt floor of an outdoor arena in this horizontal painting. The scene is loosely painted and most details are indistinct. Many of the men wear black caps and have peach or brown-colored faces. The group to our left surges near a flagpole. The group to our right eddies around a dark brown bull that stamps front feet firmly on the ground. Both groups are enlivened by swirls of buttercup yellow, scarlet red, powder blue, and bright white. One man wearing white crouches, bare bottomed, on the ground in front of the bull. More people gathered on the far side of the arena and beyond its walls pare painted with strokes and dabs of pearl white, rust red, golden brown, dark gray, ochre yellow, and black.

Eugenio Lucas Villamil

The Bullfight, c. 1890/1900

Not on View

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 73.9 x 109.9 cm (29 1/8 x 43 1/4 in.)

framed: 96.5 x 134.9 x 10.8 cm (38 x 53 1/8 x 4 1/4 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Arthur Sachs

Accession Number

1954.10.1

Artists / Makers

Eugenio Lucas Villamil (painter) Spanish, 1858 - 1918

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Provenance

Probably Édouard Kahn, Paris; (his sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 8 June 1895, no. 2); (Goldschmidt).[1] Sigismond Bardac [1856-1919], Paris; (sale, Paris, 1910). (E. Gimpel & Wildenstein, Paris), by 1924;[2] sold 1925 to Baron Maurice de Rothschild [1881-1957], Paris. Arthur Sachs [1880-1975], New York and Cannes, by 1928;[3] gift 1954 to NGA.

[1] The dimensions for this painting and its companion piece, now in the Reinhardt Collection, Winterthur, are almost identical. The Kahn sale catalogue (Catalogue des tableaux par Antoine Watteau, Boucher, Goya, Gustave Moreau, Teniers...Formant la collection K.) contains only one entry for a "course de taureau" by Goya, which is described simply as a "belle esquisse," although it is annotated with a sale price of 2500 francs. Paul Lafond, Goya, Paris, 1902:107, however, not only lists both paintings as being in this sale, but without explanation identifies no. 29 (the NGA version) as the one that sold for 2500 francs. See also the provenance for the companion piece, which is documented by Juliet Wilson-Bareau in her entry on the painting in Sammlung Oskar Reinhart 'Am Römerholz' Winterthur. Basel, 2003: no. 19, 174-177, repro.; note 5 of the entry (p. 174) provides the name of the buyer at the 1895 sale, taken from the procès verbal.

[2] August L. Mayer, Francisco de Goya, London and Toronto, 1924: 181.

[3] Sachs lent the painting to a 1928 exhibition of Spanish paintings at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. See also Jacques Seligmann & Co. Records, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington: Collectors Files, Box 203, Folder 6; copies in NGA curatorial files.

Associated Names

Bardac, Sigismond
Drouot, Hôtel
Gimpel & Wildenstein, E.
Goldschmidt, J. and S.
Kahn, Edouard
Rothschild, Maurice de, Baron
Sachs, Arthur

Exhibition History

1925: Exposition d'art ancien espagnol, Hôtel J. Charpentier, Paris, 1925, no. 41, repro.

1928: Exhibition of Spanish Paintings from El Greco to Goya, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1928, no. 6, fig. 6.

1933: A Century of Progress Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, The Art Institute of Chicago, 1933, no. 162.

1996: Obras Maestras de la National Gallery of Art de Washington, Museo Nacional de Antropología, Mexico City, 1996-1997, unnumbered catalogue, 88-89, color repro.

Technical Summary

The picture is on a fabric of tight and regular weave and adhered to a fine lining material. All tacking edges have been removed. The ground consists of a rough layer of reddish brown particles over which rich oil paint has been applied with brush and palette knife. An examination of the pigments by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy did not reveal the use of any pigments unavailable to Goya, although chrome yellow, which is present, was only introduced in the early 1800s.[1] The paint and ground layers present evidence of a history of poor adhesion. Flake losses have occurred in the thick, knife-applied layers and at cracks near the outer extremities of the picture. There are fills and retouches applied to many of the flake losses. The surface coating is somewhat dull.

[1] Identified by optical microscopy.

Bibliography

1902: Lafond, Paul. Goya. Paris, 1902: 107, no. 29.

1903: von Loga, Valerian. Francisco de Goya. Berlin, 1903: no. 547.

1908: Calvert, Albert F. Goya: An Account of His Life and Works. London, 1908: 161, no. 143.

1914: Stokes, Hugh. Francisco Goya. London, 1914: 352, no. 535.

1924: Mayer, August L. Francisco de Goya. London and Toronto, 1924: 181, no. 666.

1940: Trapier, Elizabeth du Gué. Eugenio Lucas y Padilla. New York, 1940: 48, pl. 24.

1947: Lafuente Ferrari, Enrique. Antecedentes, coincidencias e influencias del arte de Goya. Madrid, 1947: 230-231.

1948: Adhémar, Jean. Goya. New York, 1948: 22, pl. 111.

1956: López-Rey, José. "Goya and His Pupil María del Rosario Weiss." Gazette des Beaux-Arts 47 (1956): 282.

1960: Evans, Grose. Spanish Painting in the National Gallery of Art. Washington, D.C., 1960 (Booklet Number Ten in Ten Schools of Painting in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.): 40, color repro., as attributed to Goya.

1963: Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. New York, 1963 (reprinted 1964 in French, German, and Spanish): 321, repro., as attributed to Goya.

1965: Gudiol y Ricart, José. Goya. New York, [c. 1965]: 164, color repro. 165.

1965: Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 61, as Attributed to Goya.

1968: National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 53, repro., as Attributed to Goya.

1968: Shickel, Richard. The World of Goya, 1746-1828. (Time-Life Library of Art.) New York, 1968: 162-163, color ill., as Attributed to Goya.

1970: Gassier, Pierre, and Juliet Wilson. Vie et oeuvre de Francisco Goya. Paris, 1970: 356-357 (also English ed. 1971: 356-357).

1975: European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 160, repro., as Attributed to Goya.

1975: Koella, Rudolf. Collection Oskar Reinhart. Neuchâtel, 1975: 346.

1977: Glendinning, Nigel. Goya and His Critics. New Haven, 1977: 124, 321, n. 5, fig. 36.

1981: Arnaiz, Manuel José. Eugenio Lucas. Su vida y su obra. Madrid, 1981: 474, no. 342, color repro. p. 101, no. 84.

1984: Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 404, no. 563, color repro., as Attributed to Francisco de Goya.

1985: European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 185, repro.

1990: Brown, Jonathan, and Richard G. Mann. Spanish Paintings of the Fifteenth through Nineteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1990: 88-91, color repro. 89.

2003: Wilson-Bareau, Juliet. Entry for "Eugenio Lucas Villamil, zugeschrieben, Corrida." In Sammlung Oskar Reinhart 'Am Römerholz' Winterthur. Basel, 2003: no. 19, 174-177, repro.